anthenahealth IPO Leaps - CFO Comments

Since its IPO in September, athenahealth’s
(Nasdaq: ATHN) shares are up a hefty 140%. The company operates a
sophisticated on-demand network that helps improve the reimbursements
for physician practices. It’s a huge market opportunity ($18 billion
or so) and the company is growing at a sizzling rate.

Last week,
I talked to the company’s CFO, Carl Byers. In fact, he joined the
company at its founding in 1997 (before this, he was a management
consultant at Booz Allen & Hamilton).

While an IPO can be a
traumatic experience for an organization, that really hasn’t been the
case for athenahealth. “Because we must meet tough regulatory
requirements, the IPO process has not been a big change for the
company,” said Byers.

Something else: athenahealth classified all its employees as corporate insiders.

According
to Byers: “We want to make sure that employees have access to the
information they need. This has been a key part of our cultural DNA
and success.”